Maidens in the Mirror
by Petronia
Summary: The night of Suzaku's summoning, Hotohori and Nuriko engage in a game of illusions... Very "chinoiserie", all peonies and silk and gilded mirrors.


**Maidens In The Mirror**

_For Z107M, with fond memories of the Great Hotohori Write-Up_

The mirror has made a replica  
Of the one who gazed on it too long...  
Have I dreamed  
This double mouth  
With doubled pairs of lips?

— Alain Robbe-Grillet

I sorrow for the red peonies before the staircase  
For two have faded since last evening—

— Bai Juyi

* * *

Nuriko twirled the peony between thumb and forefinger and brought it to his lips, inhaling the spicy scent as he considered. Eventually he settled for snipping a finger's length off the stem's end, taking care not to remove too many leaves. The green-bronze colour was quite attractive. Just enough, then, so that the arrangement would not be crowded. He inserted the flower carefully, settling it until he felt the wire mesh at the bottom of the bronze vase catch the stem and hold it in place. There.

It had showered during the day in Eiyou, with the peculiar violence of late summer rainstorms, but the sky had cleared by the time Nuriko had wandered out into the palace gardens at sunset. He'd been entranced by the looming, near-wild peony trees – their bright flowers gilded by the lowering light – and the shorter clusters that drooped, unbalanced by the weight of the water hidden in their complex petals. Silver dress-making scissors, remnants of lady's apparel though never used, had been called into play: it was only when he'd returned to his rooms with a great bouquet, all rustling leaves and heavy, lolling blossoms sticky with bud-honey, that he'd begun to tame the mass into some measure of elegance.

The court warrior of Suzaku rotated the vase a little and stepped back, examining his creation with a critical eye. Peony arrangements tipped easily to garishness, but he thought he'd avoided that well enough. Seven peonies from bud to bloom, set at artfully uneven heights in a plume of their own foliage, shades of rose ranging from a delicate blush to the heart's blood of the Xue-Yu he'd just placed. Different yet inseparable. Nuriko smiled at the symbolism, brushing his fingertips against the silk-velvet petals. Well, perhaps, Suzaku willing. Peonies had always meant summer to him.

Of course, if his method were proper, the last element should have been placed first. A Xue-Yu peony's deep red made it the eyecatch of nearly any piece.

But Nuriko had never had the patience for method.

He sighed at the thought, tugging at the collar of the soft court-lady's gown he still wore to sleep. His rooms were overheated: he'd lit all the candles so as to have enough light to work, and closed the windows so a stray night breeze wouldn't put them out. Unnecessary measures now that he was done, not to mention harmful to the flowers. He moved the vase to the stand he'd set up for it beside his dresser. Konan's climate was hothouse enough. Really, he should just throw the door wide and leave it all night. It wasn't as if he was still in the harem, to have to worry about his reputation-

"Hotohori-sama!"

The emperor of Konan had his hand raised as if to knock when Nuriko opened the door, but lowered it at his exclamation and stepped back. "I apologize," he said. "You were going out."

"Oh. Oh, no! I was just..." Nuriko waved vaguely, recovering from his initial confusion. "Please."

Hotohori moved past him into the chamber, lifting the hem of his white robe so it wouldn't catch on the lintel – he'd changed as well, from dinner. Nuriko hesitated but decided against inquiry. They were freer with each other since their latest travels with Miaka, in ways that ofttimes had the court warrior of Suzaku at a loss as to his own feelings, let alone proper behavior. He closed the door and went to the windows instead, unlatching them.

"Please have a seat, Hotohori-sama... Would you like something to drink? Wine?" Nuriko wasn't much for tea, but he kept some chrysanthemum wine in an alcove, for coolness. Sweet, and not overly strong.

Hotohori made an affirmative sound, glancing around the room. He sat at the table as Nuriko bustled, distracting himself with the clearing away of leaves and broken stem ends, trimming of candles – efficient movements.

"I met with Chiriko again tonight," he said after a silence.

Conversation, then. "About the plans?"

"I've assigned him to oversee the logistics of the expedition to Hokkan. He seems knowledgeable enough."

"He's impressive, isn't he? I mean -" Nuriko laughed softly – "all those scholarly titles I can't even pronounce." He went to the cabinet, setting out the tray and small, enameled cups.

"They certainly are." Hotohori's voice was dry. "Even to me, and I'm given to understand that I am the institutor of those examinations. But be that as it may."

"Was anything decided?"

"Not in detail. Only that I should not be part of the expedition. Imperial duties..." Nuriko glanced at him sidewise, once again finding curious Hotohori's tendency to refer to his role in the realm as if it were a separate entity. "And of course territorial issues. Hokkan's governed by clan oligarchy; not as centralized as Konan or Kutou, but the council would take exception to the ruler of a foreign country crossing their borders incognito, and straining our relationship with neutral nations at this point would be ill-advised. Chiriko agrees with the ministers that safety is paramount, but so is speed and a certain amount of secrecy..."

Hotohori made a distracted gesture, words dying. Nuriko felt that he'd repeated the arguments for his own sake rather than for Nuriko's, so did not attempt to respond. Hotohori watched as he ladled wine from the earthern jar into a more table-appropriate vase.

"Why don't you just ring for the servants?" he asked.

Why? Nuriko glanced at him, wry answers queuing in his mind. Because he'd learnt to drink in places where you brought your own. Because he didn't trust others near his beverages – affected, tittering girlfriends in the inner court as likely as not to poison in revenge for some imagined slight. Because he had drunk a little too much altogether, during the year that he'd spent walled up in the harem, and no sense in letting the servants spread rumors.

"Habit," he said finally. He placed one porcelain cup in front of Hotohori, poured another for himself. The golden liquid was fragrant, its aftertaste lingering. He drew up a stool on the opposite side.

It was friendly, like this. Strange how that could be.

He remembered unrequited love as a sweetness and a searing pain, something that inhabited him more than it was of him. No longer. Being with Hotohori like this seemed like nothing he'd dreamed, but he couldn't remember the dreams to compare. Lost in the shuffle between demon-possessed corpses and Kutou infiltrators, he thought. The irony came tipped with a resentment he didn't comprehend.

But Nuriko was willing to endure the hurt, could even forget it at times being with him, so it had to be love.

There was a silence. Hotohori sipped, glanced at the opposite wall. Nuriko thought he was checking the dressing-table mirror until he said, "Is that what you were working on tonight?"

Nuriko turned. "The arrangement? Yes," he said, surprised. "Mostly as a way to clear my mind, I guess..."

Certainly enough had happened during the day for him to feel the need.

"I see," said Hotohori. "It's beautiful. I wouldn't-" he paused.

"Have expected it of me? That's all right. I wouldn't have expected it of me either."

"I don't mean-"

"I know, Hotohori-sama. It's a ladylike occupation, that's all, and better than embroidery."

"Do you dress like that for your... ladylike occupations?"

Nuriko blinked, startled again. Hotohori had never seemed to pay much attention to details of clothing, not even Miaka's. "I – no, actually. It's... just something I do. And I don't have much else." Utilitarianism had mostly been on his mind when he'd returned to male dress: the need to protect Miaka, to ride, to fight. No more than a change of outfit that would fit in a saddlebag. He hadn't stopped to wonder if the transition would be hard, and so it wasn't. The dependency on jewelry and rouge had died as if it had never existed.

"But why at all? Especially now. Besides which, the checks for entry to the inner court are more rigorous than simply dress, and you must have-" Nuriko's face must have reflected something of what he felt, for Hotohori stopped himself again. "I apologize," he said. "I was prying; I didn't realize."

"Not at all," Nuriko answered automatically, though he was – and disingenuously too. A fuzzy intuition told him Hotohori had really meant a different question, and that neither approached his reason for being here tonight, drinking wine at Nuriko's table.

"I was. Being an emperor in no way excuses it."

"No, Hotohori-sama. But being a fellow seishi and a _friend_ mitigates it a little." Hotohori's eyes widened briefly, and Nuriko gave a faint smile. "Why did – why do I act as a woman?"

Hotohori nodded. Nuriko wondered what answer he expected, by bringing up the issue: a vow of devotion and sacrifice to himself, perhaps?

To what purpose?

Such a vow would have been easy to formulate, and to deliver too. But the truth was something Nuriko hadn't even considered in a long time. He drank, refilled his cup, and pared down his reasons.

"I had a sister who died when I was a child. I loved her, and it seemed... wrong."

He'd anticipated a need for further explanations, as well as he could a turmoil too central to his existence – he was aware – for himself to truly grasp. He hadn't expected the sudden understanding in Hotohori's golden eyes, and was unsure whether to trust it.

Hotohori raised the cup to his lips again. After he'd replaced it meticulously on the tray, he said, "I spoke to Miaka this morning."

So.

There it was, then.

"I... wished her happiness. With him." Hotohori reached for the vase, refilling for himself before Nuriko could do so. "They've already suffered, not least because of me... Miaka deserves to be with the man she loves, and to have no regrets. There is only one right way."

"Hotohori-sama..."

"Oh, not to worry." Hotohori's mouth curved, not quite a smile. "The tale has morals, and I have gotten them by heart – though they puzzle me at times. I ask you this, for instance: if my power deserts me at the one time I have need of changing the world, should I consider it as other than a burden?"

Nuriko was silent, not knowing what to say.

"Even better, should I consider it as mine to command at all?" Hotohori drank deeply. "It's like waking from a sleep that has lasted all my life; I'm no longer quite certain of what is real. I'm no longer certain I care."

Nuriko felt cold of a sudden. He downed his wine, filling another cup – not strong, it didn't matter much – before he became conscious of why.

Hotohori had given up his claim on Miaka. And nothing had changed, neither for him nor for Nuriko.

It was a strange feeling. Not jealousy – he was past jealousy of a girl who was as much a sister to him as Kourin. No. Only a desire to protect from harm, from a pain he was willing to endure himself without so much as the merest consideration. He'd become his emperor's guard as well as his priestess's, but he didn't know when.

"I was thinking..."

Nuriko glanced up into Hotohori's eyes.

"This way of dressing, of yours. Will you show me? How you do it."

Nuriko blinked. "Ah. I – but you've _seen_ me in lady's dress. Hotohori-sama."

"No. Show _me_ how you do it."

They stared at each other while Nuriko silently repeated the sentence back to himself – stress accents and all – attempting to derive some sense from it. Sense was not to be had. Well, it did but... He was damned if he knew why Hotohori's sense of humor ran to such outrageous remarks delivered with even more outré sang-froid. He'd witnessed the other seishi teasing his ministers, during the months of Miaka's absence; only now did he understand why those on the receiving end became so flustered. You couldn't _laugh_ at the emperor, even when you knew he was putting one over on you. Not while he watched you with serious, considering eyes, as if tossing some point of policy into the cabinet debate...

It was almost cruel.

Nuriko laughed. Just a little, and it came out sharp. "Oh, but," he said, falling despite himself into the barbed preciosity of inner-court speech, "the garments I own for my use would not be fitting to my lord's complexion, let alone his frame. Such a lesson must be well-prepared..."

Hotohori raised an eyebrow. He had his elbows on the table, chin propped carelessly on one hand; he looked more at ease, Nuriko suddenly realized, than he'd ever seen him.

"Could you check?" he said.

* * *

Someone, Nuriko thought, had obviously abdicated some crucial responsibility that would have assured the comprehensibility of the world. What he was presently engaged in, for instance, was very near to madness.

He held out the pile of garments.

"The white's an underrobe. The red goes over it, but don't mind that. I'll have to do your hair first." Hotohori took the clothes. Nuriko turned before his aid could be requested – his restraint only stretched so far – and crossed to the table for another cup of wine. He tossed it back and stared at the dregs for what seemed ponderous cycles of the Shijintenchisho, totting up an inventory of pins and baubles in his head. Tried to ignore the evocative sounds behind him: soft rumpled noise of clothing discarded to the floor, rustle of silk against silk...

Silk against skin...

Utter madness.

"Nuriko..."

He set the cup down with precision and turned.

Hotohori had taken the ribbon out of his hair, letting it fall straight down his back. He turned, not at all awkward – Nuriko supposed it didn't feel much different from any loose robe, though it was flimsier than most – and Nuriko clenched his hands discreetly, digging his nails into his palms. He suddenly found himself wishing that the wine had been stronger.

Much stronger.

_My – _an only marginally more rational part of his mind noted – _ we'll have to do something about those shoulders if we're to be realistic..._

"Will you sit?" He retreated into protocol, made his voice pleasant, girlish. "Hotohori-sama?"

Like all the other chairs in the palace, the one at Nuriko's dresser was squarely built, straight-backed and rather uncomfortable. Hotohori retrieved his wine and sat on the edge of the bed, apparently not feeling that a by-your-leave was required. Nuriko joined him after a moment's hesitation, bringing with him a double handful of jars and pins. He slid to the center of the patterned silk quilt, behind Hotohori, folding his legs. The other shichiseishi waited, rotating his cup thoughtfully to catch candle-highlights in the liquor's golden depth. Nuriko himself had often done the same while under the ministrations of his maids.

"Is there some... does Hotohori-sama have a preference?"

"Hmm?" The golden gaze startled in the mirror across the way, as if caught out of reverie. "Oh. No, do as you like." A smile. "As you think it should be."

Nuriko murmured assent. Selecting a small jar of black and red enamel, he poured some of its contents onto his palms. The scent was spicy-sweet, attar of peonies mingling with jasmine and santal, as well as other rare woods Nuriko could not identify but which made him nostalgic for half-remembered moments in his childhood, playing with Kourin among the chests and bales of silk in their father's warehouse... He used first his fingers, then a tortoiseshell brush, combing the fragrant oil into the cascade of Hotohori's hair until it was satin to the touch. Strangely, he found the ritualistic motion calmed his nerves.

His emperor was not the only one for whom the world had taken on an aura of the unreal.

Most men in Konan kept their hair long, and younger, more leisured members of society would often wear it free, or loosely held by a ribbon. Even so, Nuriko knew himself for a special case. He had stopped having his hair cut after... afterwards, one of many minor sacrifices for a wish the gods had failed to grant. He no longer believed in those superstitions, but the tangle of impulses survived. Unbound, his hair swept the floor in violet waves, individual wisps still flyaway. It had been quite unruly when it was shorter, he remembered – and realized that he could no longer evoke what that felt like.

He parted Hotohori's hair with both hands, lifting only the top layer. Now _this_ was different from his own: denser, warm and silken like the pelt of some fur-animal under his hands. Heavy. So heavy that gravity had removed the natural wave Nuriko sensed. The strands he collected in a loose twist held hidden life, caressing his fingers. The color was the same, a rather non-descript ash-brown it seemed, but let the light hit right and the highlights were honey, were gold...

It was awkward. Most ladies' hairstyles were not designed to be handled by a single pair of hands; the bangs escaped him, and he let them be. His own hair unraveled inevitably after being set, but Hotohori's resisted such treatment from the start. He managed to coil it into an asymmetrical loop, which – after the deployment of jeweled combs and a dozen hairpins – stayed in place, much to his relief.

"What is this?" Fingertips tracing the haut-relief design on the largest of three combs – a golden phoenix, ruby eyes aglow in the candlelight – trailing over the edge of an outspread wing. "It looks like an antique piece."

Nuriko reached out, captured the errant hand before anything was disturbed, before he could think. "It is. It belonged to my grandmother. Don't touch anything yet-"

Hotohori's hand tensed in his, relaxed – and Nuriko was suddenly _aware, slender fingers running over his as they slipped out of his loosened grasp, unintentionally it must have been, warmth of him perceived like candleflame behind a flimsy screen, the scent of peonies worn against skin..._ He withdrew his hand quickly and returned to his arrangement of Hotohori's hair, gathering the bottom layer of ashen-gold into an elaborate ponytail. Some instinct whispered, however, that a balance had been disturbed. The curve of Hotohori's nape made him think confused thoughts of power given and taken, too diffuse even to be taboo. He glanced up to check the effect in the glass, and was met with a vision. Young girls: golden eyes dreamy-blank, lavender eyes deer-startled. Maidens like flowers in their disarrayed robes.

He couldn't see himself in the mirror.

"It's been a long time," said Hotohori suddenly.

Nuriko shook himself, distracted from the inexplicable disorientation. "Hotohori-sama?"

"I was just wondering what it was that... It's been a long time since anyone's brushed my hair for me."

Nuriko paused, surprised.

"It was something... my mother used to do."

Nuriko smiled uneasily, resuming the task he'd abandoned. Golden pacesways slipped into Hotohori's hair, chiming with jade. "So did mine. It's a motherly thing, I suppose." The dowager empress had been only a few years in her grave when Nuriko had entered the inner confines of the harem. Officially and between acquaintances, she was spoken of with the utmost respect – affection even. The other stories came in secret and in passing allusion, whispers hushed with the unthinking terror of accustomance...

"She came to visit me less as I grew older. Court intrigues occupy time." There was no resentment in the voice, only a detachment Nuriko found strange. "She died young, you know; the same illness of the lungs she'd always had. She wanted the world at her feet before it took her. She... she was beautiful. As a child I used to think that when the-" Hotohori paused abruptly, then continued in a softer voice. "They say I take after her."

Of course.

Was it ghosts Nuriko conjured with silks and jewels, then?

Other than his own...

Nuriko did not ask. He didn't want to be where he was, suddenly. It seemed desecration of whatever game of innocence Hotohori played, and to his shock he found the thought pleasing. There was heat in his body; he didn't know whether it would grow.

Gods, he must be bitter. But against whom? Against what?

He rose without a word, retrieved the rest of the clothing. Hotohori got to his feet, raising his arms so Nuriko could drape the sleeveless garment about him – it was essentially a long rectangle of crimson silk, edged with a wide border of embroidery in gold thread. He ran a finger over the pattern, eyes shadowed as he watched illusion increment in the mirror.

"Peonies again, hmm?"

"Coincidence," Nuriko said. "A question of coloring..."

He stopped, not trusting himself. But balance proved elusive. By the time he finished with the sash about Hotohori's waist he wanted wine again. A demon; of many merely the most familiar.

He helped Hotohori into the last robe – silk utterly translucent, cunningly dyed so that the rose color deepened at the hems and in the long trailing sleeves – and knelt so he could tie the loose front panels together. Finishing touches. A length of red silk cord wrapped over the sash to gird it in place, jade rings and beads intricately knotted into the hanging ends. Nuriko had no awareness of his hands trembling, but the loop of the fastening would not go over the knot. He fumbled once, twice, and was startled when warm fingers covered his.

"I'll do it," said Hotohori. Nuriko lowered his hands, brushing against layered silk in seeming accident. Hotohori did not appear to notice.

"I've a riddle for you, Hotohori-sama," Nuriko said, feeling the need to break the quiet in some way, any way. His voice trembled only slightly.

"A riddle?" Jade tinkled ever so softly as the girdle shifted. When had time slowed so? "Please."

Nuriko swallowed. "Like blossom yet not blossom, like mist yet not mist, it comes veiled in midnight and passes with morn.

"Its arrival is as spring dreams – how long do such last? Its leave-taking is as dawn clouds – none shall know whence."

A pause. "That is a poem."

"Yes... I suppose."

"A famed quatrain of the last dynasty." Hands touched his shoulders, and he lifted his head to meet his emperor's faint smile. "Do get up, Nuriko. I have no answer to that, you must have known. The immortal poet did not deign to supply us with a solution. Some say he spoke of dead love, others poesy, some say he meant all existence is fleeting illusion. Who knows?"

Nuriko laughed shakily. He rose to his feet. "I thought that, perhaps, Hotohori-sama-"

"Is mere humanity at that, and no great unraveller of ancient mystifications." Hotohori spread his arms in a susurration of trailing sleeves, near-coquettish. "Besides. Do I look so very much like an emperor to you?"

Nuriko gazed. "No," he said truthfully. The rose-and-crimson vision impelled heat within him like an essence of the candlelight, but it was far from the familiar heartache. It was as if all his time of fruitless longing had not been desire at all: falsehood, like Kourin's form molded from his own.

Had he ever wanted like this...?

"It is well, then," said Hotohori. He tilted his head a little to the side, golden eyes sliding toward the dressing-table mirror behind Nuriko, and the picture... was flawless.

Nuriko turned, searching over the the clutter on the table. "It's only details now, Hotohori-sama." The peonies. He reached out for the Xue-Yu; the glass, obedient, threw back the movement in Kourin's image.

The riddle had an answer, in the women's quarters where such double-entendres were passed about, garbled, as futile amusement. He no longer felt capable of repeating it.

Suzaku's grace, he was a fool. He would take-

The tiniest of efforts to snap the stem; a twist of his fingers. Peonies were such fragile, overbred flowers.

Behind him Hotohori made a soft sound of surprise. "But you've broken your arrangement."

"It would have faded anyway," Nuriko said. He turned, cupping the full-blown blossom in one hand. Despite – or perhaps because of – his confusion, he felt reckless. "If existence is illusion and life unmindful sleep, then so is beauty fleeting, isn't it, Hotohori-sama?"

Soft laugh. Rueful? "Yes. I suppose."

"Then I would rather this flower spend its beauty in the service of a greater." Two steps took him back to the side of the bed. Hotohori sat and remained quite still as Nuriko placed the peony in his hair, adjusting the jeweled combs to hold it in place. "One last touch..."

"One?"

Nuriko tore a petal from the Xue-Yu. Crushed it between his fingers; brushed the moisture over his lips, staining them with flower-blood crimson. "One," he whispered, and Hotohori's eyes were on his mouth, so he took the petal on his tongue and bent and kissed him, bitter taste of bruised flower and behind that the heat of Hotohori's lips startled apart, like honey but not quite, lapping at the sweet dew that gathers on peony buds, butterflies drawn during the brief June night... He pushed Hotohori back and down, using his weight to unbalance them, and found himself half-kneeling over his emperor. Who gazed up at him quietly, golden eyes already shading from surprise to something less readable. The movement had broken their kiss.

"Nuriko." Hotohori's voice was muted, almost gentle. "Who do you see?"

Who do you see?

Nuriko stared back at him. You, of course. I want you...

Lovely, like this-

To myself...

_To see myself..._

Kourin would never want, like this.

Nuriko pushed away from the bed, a queer little sound coming from his throat. The note horrified him by its rawness. He stumbled back a step and pressed both hands against his mouth, hard enough so that they did not tremble.

Watched Hotohori as he sat, drawing translucent silk about his shoulders.

"You never asked me what I saw," he said after a silence. "Dreamt, rather, tonight..."

His throat was over-tight. "What did you dream, then? Hotohori-sama?"

_Mirrored in your eyes..._

"A young girl." The elaborate hairstyle had half-unraveled, ashen-gold tumbling straight about Hotohori's shoulders. When he stood Nuriko heard rather than saw the pins falling, a sharp tinkle of bells. "A lovely maiden – your sister, perhaps. A young girl I'd never seen, with quiet eyes and deft hands, who fills the hearts of those she attends with peace..."

_Kourin._

One step and warm arms enfolded him, just as he understood and the breath seemed to die within his lungs. Hotohori held him quietly – simply held – Nuriko not caring what echo of realization had occasioned the movement. For Hotohori had impulses of kindness for only one person, really.

Like cool water, this feeling; like wings unfolding in air too rarefied for flight. Grief overly pure for irony. Remembering laughter, a child's hand in his, Kourin who had lived and breathed then-

And in the mirror, still.

Would she even have loved?

He didn't know.

He could only speak for himself after all.

"One dream for me," Hotohori murmured finally, low, his breath stirring violet strands by Nuriko's ear. "One for you. But when that's – I'm sorry, Nuriko."

Perhaps he was.

Nuriko closed his eyes. Unfitting, this sorrow. "You're... you're right, Hotohori-sama. That does sound like her. She – she would have liked to meet you, I think. She would have..."

Did those arms tighten? "Nuriko..."

"Just hold me a little," he whispered. "Just... a little more. Please."

* * *

_— Montreal, December 1999 _

Notes:

1. Xue-Yu Blood Jade. Of course there's no way peonies could be in flower at that time of year even in Konan, but have pity on me.

2. That's late Tang dynasty court lady costume Hotohori was wearing. I was going to go with Song, since that seemed to be the general tenor of the series, but Tang won out on sexiness.

3. Bai Juyi's original quatrain ("blossom not-blossom") was twenty-six exquisite syllables. My translation is – uh – not. Scholarly consensus is the poet was actually mourning the untimely death of some young beauty, a not uninteresting point considering the fate of our protagonists, alas...

4. Pacesway transliteration of "bu-yao." You see'em in Miaka's hair. It's easier to type than "decorative chopstick pins with bells and stuff dangling from the end."


End file.
